Never, Not Ever
by lovegood27
Summary: Lily Evans did not like James. She never had and she never would. At least, that's what she thought...


Lily was fuming. But the weird thing was she didn't know at who. Severus or James?

She still couldn't believe he had called her a Mudblood. They were best friends! Or at least, they had been.

Severus was not the boy that Lily knew anymore. He hadn't been for a long time. Ever since fourth year, he had began hanging out with other people, spending less and less time with Lily. Lily wouldn't have minded, she had plenty of her own friends, if it weren't for the actual people. Severus had taken an interest in in the Dark Arts, much to Lily's disapproval, and his friends weren't helping. The whole lot of them seemed to only be focused on one thing, which was joining Lord Voldemort, and they were rubbing off on Severus. They were already calling themselves "death eaters". Lily didn't understand what was so brilliant about joining Lord Voldemort. As far as she was concerned, Voldemort was a dangerous Dark wizard who was not to be talked about and who no one certainly had any business working for.

And of course, there was James.

He was an interesting case. Because he liked her, even though she hated him. But she hated him because he bullied Severus and she was also mad at Severus. It was all so confusing. Except Severus wasn't the only person James bullied. No, that big-headed toe rag bullied pretty much everyone but her, hexing random people in the corridors because he felt like it and thought it was funny. She would have tried to get him to stop even if she wasn't Prefect. But every time she saw him hexing someone and tried to stop it, his reply was "I will if you go out with me, Evans."

Fat chance of that ever happening.

"I will if you stop hexing people for the fun of it," Lily would reply every time. But apparently, he didn't like her enough to stop his hexing, though he still constantly asked her out.

That was what had happened just then when he and his little group of "marauders" had ganged up on Severus again.

"Leave him alone!," Lily had yelled at him.*

"I will if you go out with me Evans," he had said yet again.*

Lily had lost her patience with him. "I wouldn't go out with you if it was a choice between you and the giant squid."*

At least James had left Severus alone after that. Lily had thought that Severus would be grateful to her. But he had called her a Mudblood.

Lily sighed, and quickly gave the Fat Lady the password and entering the Gryffindor Common Room. She knew Severus was following her to apologise but she didn't want to speak to him and he wouldn't be able to get into the Common Room.

"You and Potter at it again?," Lily's fellow Gryffindor Alice asked, grinning, as Lily entered her dorm and flopped down on her bed. Everyone knew the that Lily hated James but that James liked her.

"Mmhh," was all Lily said, her voice muffled by her pillow.

"Come on Lily, give the bloke a chance," Alice told her. Lily sat up at that, her eyes on fire.

"I won't give him a chance, he doesn't deserve one," Lily said angrily. "He's arrogant, rude, thinks he's better than everyone just because he's on the Quidditch team, and sends hexes at random people in the corridor just because they're there. Do you think he deserves a chance?"

Alice rolled her eyes. It was this same thing every time. "No, but he's fancied you for 5 years and all you have to say about him is the negative things about him. Have you ever thought that he does all that stupid stuff to impress you?"

This was new to Lily. And the answer was that she hadn't.

"Well, it's not working then," Lily said. "He needs to treat people better before he has a chance of going out with me."

Alice looked at her curiously. "You know, sometimes I think you actually like James," she said. Lily looked at her incredulously.

"Me? Like James?" Lily laughed. "I don't like James, I never had and I never will."

"Never?," Alice looked disappointed. "I think you two would make a good couple actually."

Lily shook her head. "We wouldn't. And that's if we got together. I'm never going to go out with him and fall in love with him. Never."

"You just said that you might if he treated people better!," Alice protested. She really wanted them to be together, especially since Lily was the only girl in their dorm who didn't have a boyfriend.

"But it doesn't look like he's going to be doing that is he?," Lily said. "So no. I will never like him."

She herself harboured hopes that James would become a nicer person, come sixth year. Though she would never admit it, Lily agreed with Alice and thought that if only James was nicer to people, they would be good together. Her hopes were crushed however, when James started taunting Severus as soon as they had gotten on the Express at the start of sixth year.

But Severus was always a special case with James. A few days into getting back, Lily found that James really was being nicer to people and had stopped jinxing people for the stupid reason which was that they existed. He still wanted to tease Severus but he seemed to be able to stop himself for Lily's sake and she began to develop an attraction to him.

Unfortunately, the only person who didn't know about it was Lily herself. It was very obvious to the other people because every time a girl flirted with James, Lily would be killing the girl with her glare. But for Lily, her newfound fancy for James was buried deep down under her now false hate for him.

James also noticed. He noticed that Lily spent a lot more time with him and that she smiled much more at him. He pushed down his hope that she might like him and decided it would be best to bide his time and wait.

"Lily, you fancy James, just admit it," her friends were constantly telling her.

"I don't like him, I never have and I never will," Lily always replied, stubborn as ever.

Severus, though he hated to admit it, also knew that Lily likes James and that any chance he had had with her was gone. Now, filled with bitter jealousy, it was Severus who was making rude remarks at James. Lily noticed, and that was one of the reasons she could not bring herself to forgive Severus. Whenever Severus and his Death Eater friends ganged up on James, she would be there to shield him, throwing insults back at them.

It was clearer than ever now. Lily still refused to believe that she liked James. But she realised that she had always known and she was denying the truth. She liked James.

It wouldn't hurt if she did and it would make everyone a lot happier if she admitted it. So she did. She flirted with him, became close friends with him and finally James decided she definitely liked him. So he asked her out.

And she said yes.

A/N: Let me know what you think of this! PLEASE REVIEW :3

*From Order of the Phoenix, Snape's Worst Memory by JK ROWLING: I DON'T OWN HARRY POTTER


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